3 BAPTISMAL DATES IN AUGUST

Hey there!

Well, somehow the past week has flown by.  The mission has changed so much!  We had 10 new missionaries show up and 10 missionaries become RMs.  Needless to say, it was a weird week for many, including me.

It is funny that you ask about the terror threat, because it literally hasn't changed anything that we do here.  We go out and work as usual... there is nothing else we can really do!  It was all the other stuff that interrupted the week.

We didn't really have time to be in our area on Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday. Each of those days was filled with memories.

On Tuesday we got to go pick up the new missionaries from the airport!  That was a day filled with Nostalgia.  We watched them come through the gate, and I just remember coming though the gate myself.  (The only difference was they had all of there bags with them!) We got to drive them into the mission home and help them get settled in.  We spent the night with them and had dinner with President and Sister Evans.  Elder Whetten was getting his last moments of missionary out with them.  The poor guy was hurting.

It was really hard to see Whetten, Badger, and Weaver to leave.  They were the people I felt like I knew the best in the mission at this point.  But I learned a lot from it. I had a great day of studies on Friday when things finally slowed down and I just knew that all I had to do was go as hard as I could till the last day of my mission.  If I could do that, I would be happy, both now and when I would come home.  There was a lot more that I learned with my studies that day... but I don't think I can adequately express that, so I am not going to try.

Anyways, Wednesday came and I was super swamped with moves.  I picked up Elder H (my new companion)  in the morning and then we spent the day with the new missionaries, getting them oriented and shipping them out to their different areas. Three of them took the same flight I did to Bergen more than 1.5 years ago.  Finally after our time was done with them we went back to the mission home and had a "burny dinner" with the departing missionaries.  

We then woke up at 4 the next morning and drove the departing missionaries to the airport and put them on a plane home.  That was interesting.  By the end of that day Elder Holden and I were dead.  We fell asleep at 6 that night (with permission) and didn't wake up till the next morning.

Then we got to work in our area.  And we did a lot.  We met with J.A..  He is still not ready for baptism and is starting to give push back in preparing for the date.  So we need more pray and fasting for him.  Hopefully we can get him in the water.

We saw A in the park on Saturday.  He said that his wife's surgery went as expected and she was recovering.  So things went well for them this week!  We got to give them a blessing earlier this week too.  S loved it.

Other than that we got to eat dinner with J on Sunday.  He is doing well and is just so ready for baptism! He was telling us about the spiritual experiences he has had.  It was actually a really powerful meeting.  I loved it.

We also got another baptismal date with a man named C.  So that makes 3 dates for August 30th.  Things are really starting to roll here in Sandvika!  

Anyways, I am going to get out of the office now for a little bit!

Jeg elsker deg!

Eldste Jones

Hey I have no time to write today!  I will write something tomorrow morning during personal study.  I love you!

Note from Mom:  I was happily surprised when the following email showed up several hours later!!  What a wonderful surprise,  but I have to admit I was kind of looking forward to a letter tomorrow!!

Okay well, we have had some appointments cancel tonight so now I have time to write.  I am sure it won't be a lot though...

But ya this last week was insanely busy.  Yet again.  

I got to go BERGEN.  To be honest I didn't think to much about it till I got into Bergen.  But when we started flying over the fjord there I started to lose it.  I love Bergen!  It was an awesome day to get to be with the missionaries there and help everyone out.  We had an awesome meeting and I got to see a little bit of the town!  It was super cool.  I can't wait to go back for the Dyches conference in a couple weeks!

The conference in Stavanger was pretty sweet to.  But after both meetings Elder Wh and I were both whipped.  So we got back at 10:45 on Thursday night and just died.  We woke up the next day and just had even more to do though so we kept going.

We taught a ton of people throughout the week.  We taught our Brazilian family again.  We found out that the mother has breast cancer.  She was diagnosed 2 weeks ago, right before they went on vacation. But they told us our first lesson when they were back.  It was a super powerful lesson in which the spirit was so strong!  We testified that Jesus Christ was there to help us and that the things that we experience in life are actually gifts from our Heavenly Father.  They loved it.  We were able to go back and give a blessing later in the week.  They loved that to.  She is going to be having surgery on Thursday so we hope that everything goes well.  Keep her in your prayers.

Other than that we had more awesome teaches with J.  He is doing great.  He made us a full Salmon dinner and then we taught him.  It was unbelievable.  We had our new Ward mission leader with us on the teach and things just went super well.  He was sick unfortunately on Sunday so he couldn't come to church, but he was reading and praying.  So things are just progressing super well with him!

We also got to teach Jon Axel!  We got a baptismal date with him to! We have worked so hard with him over the past month while his family has been in the Philippines and the day after they got home we went over to teach and got a date with him.  It was a way intense lesson though.  We asked him to be baptized like 5 times before we realized that we just had to ask him to prepare for a specific date in the future.  He then agreed.  The spirit was definitely guiding us there as well.  It was amazing!

We met with L as well, he is doing good.  His progression is a little bit slower even though he is reading so much.  He has had a lot of bad things happen in his life and it is really hard for him to understand it all.  So we are going to have to be really patient with him.

Other than that we had to plan for moves that is happening this week.  We did that till about 1 last night.  But everything is seeming to work.  So life is good.

So yep that was my week.  I think that is all I have time to write right now, so till next week, when I hopefully have more time.  

Jeg elsker deg!

Din sønn,

Eldste Jones

THE FIRST THING HE SAID WAS "I AM THINKING ABOUT JOINING YOUR CHURCH!"

Heia!

Well, yep.  Somehow another week has flow by.  It seems to get faster every week!

This past one we added a couple more flights to the tally.  I think I have now flown around 56 times here in Norway.  By the end of the coming week I will be just short of 60.  That being said, we were in Trondheim this last week.  It was a beautiful day, well actually it wasn't.  There was a lot of thunder and lightning there.  I don't think I have ever been so close to it before... we were out contacting and the thunder came within 1 second of the blinding flash of lightning.  So that was an experience.  Then it started dumping rain.  Another experience.

The workshops that we did have been super good though.  The missionaries have been super responsive and have learned a lot.  We are getting a lot of good feedback on it.  We have two more of them to do this week.  We travel to Stavanger first on Wednesday and then we get to go back to Bergen!!!  I am so excited to go back!  First time in what has been over a year.  It should be pretty sweet.

The rest of the week has been insanely busy.  We had lots of miracles that came down in our proselyting area again.  We got a referral from the bishop that was just Golden.  He is a 36 year old norwegian guy.  He saw a lot of Mormon tabernacle choir and got interested.  He emailed the bishop who then emailed us.  We called him and the first thing he said was "I am thinking about joining your church!"  No one says that!  Anyways we had a great lesson with him on Saturday and invited him to Pres. and Sis. Evan's house for dinner Sunday.  He even came to all three hours of Church in a white shirt and tie!  The man is about as gold as you get.  He has set a date for the 30. August.  It should be great.

Other than that we had some really spiritual lessons with Jon-Axel and Leif Husby, our other two Norwegian men.  They both came to church as well.  All together we had 4 Norwegian men come to church!  That was a miracle, probably the biggest one I have seen in a while.  The last man that came was a Norwegian guy that married a member from Arizona.  The member is inactive though.  So it was a huge miracle that they came.  

There is so much happening and so much that needs to happen in the next couple weeks.  We have moves next week. Elder Wh and Elder W go home next Thursday.  We have 10 (5 elders, 5 sisters) coming in July, we have 1 elder in september, and then we have 15 (4 elders, 11 sisters) coming in october, and then some more in november.  So we have a lot of transfers to plan.  

Sorry about not taking pictures... I really just don't ever think about it.  I think Elder Wh took some of the farm but we should be going out there next week, so maybe we will take some then.  We will be back in Bergen, there is always pictures to be taken there!  

Anyways, this is Elder Wh last real p-day.  We are going to try and get out of the office and do some stuff for him today.

Jeg elsker deg så mye!

Dallin

Elder Bednar is coming to our mission September 7!

Heia!

Well, the fourth of July came and went pretty quietly here in Norway. I am glad to hear that things were normal back home!  I miss that.

This week here has been no exception either. It was busy as usual.  We had more stuff to do than we had time for.  It is hard to believe that a week has passed since the last email I sent.

We had another MLC.  That meant that we had another month that went by.  I can't believe that I have been here in Sandvika now for 3 months.  It seems like I just got here yesterday.  MLC was good though.  Elder Wh and I got a lot of feedback from the missionaries about these workshops that we will be holding.  The rest of the night was spent with the Traveling Assistants planning and doing work in the office.  So Tuesday was basically a whole day of work, either in Meetings or in the office.

Wednesday was a day much the same.  As was thursday.  We got to work for a period of 2 hours in Sandvika and we had a ton of success.  We found like 15 people in 2 hours.  It was such a huge blessing from the Lord.  I still don't understand it.   But he really does bless us a lot.  

Friday was our first day of doing workshops here in the mission.  We went out to Tønsberg and did a 7 hour meeting there.  It was a super good meeting.  We got to go over a lot of skills and really help people to start develop them.  It was a blast to be with the missionaries.  There was about 20 of us there in this super small chapel.  It was the fourth of July so we finished our meeting singing the Star spangled banner.  It was awesome.  

We had a pretty busy day on Saturday.  We had lots of lessons that were kind of all over the place.  We had a lesson out in this small farming town called Sylling.  The family that we taught lived literally on the side of a fjord and were boxed in by a huge mountain.  It was the most beautiful farm I have ever seen.  They were sheep herders, so they just had a ton of animals over the whole place.   It actually was way cool. The lesson we taught these people was actually pretty good too.  K, the wife, is norwegian.  She married L, who is a guy from Sri Lanka.  They have 2 kids.  They were super sincere and just loved the message.  We look forward to going back soon!

After that lesson we had a couple in Oslo with the Elders there and then a couple other smaller lessons in Sandvika.  All of them went relatively well.  

We had a little bit of an adventure though.  The sisters in Asker popped two tires on their car on Saturday.  So we had to go out and help them with their spare tire and then get a new one for them so they could get back on the road.  It was actually a welcomed break for the day.

I forgot which day it was this week, but we also got to go out with one of our investigators and pick strawberries!  I don't think that I have ever had such good strawberries before!  It is definitely the season here in Norway to get them.

I found out that one of the people I taught in Oslo has a baptismal date now.  I don't know if you remember him, but he is from Taiwan.  He is here on exchange.  He will hopefully get baptized here in a couple of weeks.

There was a lot of other stuff that happened. We found out that Elder Bednar will visit the mission on September 7.  So the whole mission is pumped about that.  Only half of the mission will get to see him though. He is doing a stake conference and then is holding a missionary meeting for 3 hours right afterward.  We can't fly eveyone in for it.  So it is only the people that are close enough to take a train.  Everyone is hoping to get sent to the east or telemark zones now haha.  

We are preparing for Elder Dyches to come on August 13. Elder Wh and I have to basically plan that whole thing before Elder Wh goes home.  So that should be fun.  We also have to plan for moves in 2 weeks, when Elder Wh leaves.

To answer question about all the people going home, yes there are 3 groups going home.  There are 4 elders in 2 weeks, and then there is 1 elder in September and then there are 10 sisters in October.  Then it is my group in November.  We get 3 new groups during that time too.

The mission is changing a lot!  It is so great to be here though!

Anyways, I have to get going.  

Jeg elsker deg!

Eldste Jones

Hey there,

Once again, I have a super busy Monday.  We have already done all the monday chores and gone out and done service for a woman.  We now have a ton of stuff to do here in the office.

This next week will be crazy.  We have MLC tomorrow and then we are starting our workshops with President in the mission. The first one this week will be in Tønsberg.  That will be the Telemark zone.  It should be pretty fun.  

Other than that we have just a couple of days to work in our area.  Because of all the traveling we have been doing we have been getting swamped in our area.  We don't have any time to work with our own investigators.  That has been one of the most frustrating things about being in the office.  You just don't get enough time to be a missionary!  That is okay though, we have tons of cool experiences anyway!

First we got to go to Trondheim!  It was sweet, we were with the Mckenzies all night Monday. That was the longest day of the year and we had permission to stay up and see the midnight sun.  So we did that.  During the day we worked with the zone leaders.  I had some of the most spiritual contacts of my mission on that splits. We talked to this woman named C.  She just had all of the right questions.  I got to watch Elder C bear some super powerful testimony.  I have never wanted to teach someone so bad!  Anyways, it was by far the most spiritual contact I have had.  It is hard to explain over the phone though. 

I got to eat dinner with Sondre.  He seems to be doing good, but he is lacking direction.  So I have to start working with him so that we don't lose him when the Bradfords leave Trondheim.  They are leaving here next week. CRAZY!  It was good getting to speak with him though.  I loved it.

The few things that did happen in our area this week though were pretty cool though. There is a newly moved family here in Sandvika named the Edlunds. They were living in Sweden for a while but they moved here for the summer.  They met a guy Name Leif  and took him to church with them.  He is from Trondheim!  Needless to say, we got along pretty well.  We got to teach him one time as well.  It went really well, the Edlunds invited him to dinner and then we taught afterward.  It was so awesome to see members just doing the work without anyone telling them to do anything!  I really hope that this goes through!  We need to show the members that they can do the work themselves!  

We also have been able to work with our other investigator Jon-axel a lot.  He is doing a lot of progression right now.  His son was baptized a couple months ago and we are really trying to get him to follow with him.  He has been investigating for more than 5 years now though, so things are moving really slow.  I have to say though that I have never had more spiritual lessons than I do when I am with Jon-axel.  I hope to see something go through with it all.

We have had a ton of people come through the door with a lot of potential and for one or another reason they fall through!  Elder Wh and I really want a baptism together, and we are working really hard to make it happen.  

I am loving life though!  I don't think I have ever grown so much in my entire life.  It is freaking me out though because it is getting to be down to the amount of time that Elder Wh had when I got here.  When that is the case I am really going to freak out because then there will be like no time left at all!  Time never stops.  It is really unfortunate.  

I have already probably used to much time on this email as is... so I should get going!

Jeg elsker deg så mye!

Eldste Jones

Sancthansaften

I just got to trondheim!  We traveled this morning early. So now we have a crazy day in front of us.  We are going to work for a couple hours and then we are going to have the sancthansaften, the norwegian longest day of the year.  We are all going to stay up late with the members and celebrate here.  So we are going there at 7.  So it should be a good day.  

This past week we were busy too.  We had zone conference and splits in Stavanger.  So that was a busy weekend.  I loved it though. Being back in the west was awesome.  I have missed being in Bergen so much!  I didn't go back there but Stavanger reminded me so much of it.  So maybe I am going to plot a return trip for one reason or another haha.  Probably not though, the traveling AP's were just there. So I think that ship has sailed.

Anyways I am going to eat dinner with Sondre!  So that is my plan for tonight.  I also get to have the party.  There is a lot to do in this next week.  We have 2 more zone conferences and then we are going to start traveling with pres for interviews and workshops that elder wh and I are going to run.

I can't forget!!!!  HAPPY BIRTHDAY!  I hope that you have an awesome day!  I wish I could be there. I hope you know that I love you and am so thankful for everything that you have done for me! 

Jeg elsker deg!

Dallin

IT WAS A GREAT TESTIMONY TO ME THAT MEMBERS NEED NOT BE AFRAID TO INVITE PEOPLE TO HEAR THE GOSPEL...JUST NEED TO SHOW SOME LOVE AND GIVE A SIMPLE INVITATION.

Heia!

I had another interesting food experience that rivals the previous one.  This one is called asida.  It is a dish that comes from Sudan.  All it is is a ton of flour that is mixed with tasteless natural yogurt. It turns out to be an awful paste that you have to eat.  The taste isn't horrible, but the consistency is.  I think I gagged the entire meal.  The worst part was that we had to eat the whole thing!  So there was no stopping early.  The investigators just made us keep eating... Somehow we made it.

I got to go on splits with Elder E (MTC companion)!  It took like 1.5 years but we finally did it!  It was super sweet actually. We had such a good splits experience.  We worked super hard and we got to finally catch up. It is funny though, you can see the growth in each other so well!  I was truly blessed to have such a good companion to start.  While I was there on splits I got to go back to the T family's house.  They fed all the missionaries their delicacy again.  I got to say no thank you this time!  So that was a blessing too.  But I literally felt like I was back serving in Oslo.

We didn't really get to work with our investigators this week.  R missed our last couple appointments and then went on vacation for a while.  So we won't work with him for a while.  We never did get to meet with the family from Brazil.  They were busy all week and we were to.  So it was a super slow week with the investigators actually.

We did 2 really cool teaches though.  The first was with a woman that is named K.  She was a referral from a member through Mormon.org.  J, a member from the united states, sat next to K on a plane here in Europe.  So they talked and J got K's info and sent it to us through mormon.org. She said that K would love a visit.  We went to K's house and knocked on the door.  A girl answered and we told her that we were looking for a woman named K.  We heard a voice from the the house that said, let them in!  So we walked in and found K at the kitchen table.  We were introduced to the family and we started to teach them!  It was a great teach and we were invited to come back for dinner! 

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It was a great testimony to me that members need not be afraid to invite people to hear the gospel.  They don't need a super deep relationship with someone, they just need to show some love and then give a simple invitation.  I am being super blessed because of that.  

Another good experience was one we had by our own efforts.  We met a dude from Mylasia.  His name is B.  We taught him on a park bench and were able to answer his questions about the atonement.  It was a spiritual experience for me to see someones testimony strengthened.  We get to meet with him again to.

I got to get going though.  I have to go get some stuff ready for this week.  We are traveling out to Stavanger for Zone conferences now.  This week we are in Stavanger, next week we are in Trondheim and Oslo.  So there will be some traveling.  I will be traveling early on Monday morning next week, so my email will probably be a little shorter.  Just an FYI.  

Jeg elsker deg så mye!

Eldste Jones